What is the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme?

The CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme facilitates the co-creation of disruptive and breakthrough solutions, business ideas and opportunities for supporting innovative, diversity-based, quality and health-centred food systems in Europe.

We strengthen the ongoing transitions to agroecological, biodiversity based and organic practices and systems by opening up the innovation cycle and bringing together people from diverse backgrounds to co-create tomorrow’s products and services, in the sustainable agriculture sector that is continuously growing despite the harsh economic environment.

We propose a bottom up approach for the development of data driven solutions that will contribute to a greener and fair future with efficiency and transparency in the ecological, biodiversity based, organic agriculture sector.

The creation process will be fueled by the support of relevant communities. These will be encouraged to generate and make sense of data, fostering informed decision making and solutions that assist farmers in improving their production and competitiveness policy makers in implementing strategies for meeting the UN Sustainable Development Goals and the UNFCCC Paris Agreement while opening up the discussion on open data in agriculture and decision making.

The CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme aims to promote innovation for diversity-based food systems in European agriculture, supporting the development of innovative solutions and applications that utilize agriculture-related big data, solutions that create new tools for farmers and propose new business models for land data governance. It is a programme designed to facilitate Open Innovation in the agrifood sector, to create new technologies, applications, platforms, and processes that will allow the upgrade of tools and methods that are implemented nowadays in the ecological, biodiversity based, organic agriculture sector. This actively contributes to the provision of improved services and experiences to the CAPSELLA stakeholders and communities, and to all European citizens interested in sustainably produced, tasty and nutritious food (#AgriTech #Agri-food Technology).

Participants are invited to freely choose among cutting edge CAPSELLA challenges υsing among their creativity and inspiration and with the guidance of the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme, mentoring and training they will be encouraged to develop their own disruptive ideas that will shape the future of ecological, diversity based agri-food value chains.

The ultimate goal of the CAPSELLA Accelerator Programme – «Creating innovative solutions for boosting the transition to ecological, diversity based, organic agriculture», is not only realized through a competition which culminated onFriday 06.10.2017 and Saturday 07.10.2017. It included a warmup event on 25.09.2017 to contribute to building stronger teams and deep understanding of CAPSELLA Acceleration Challenges, and continues after the competition by supporting the selected winners with a targeted growth program that includes training, mentoring and incubation to achieve the transformation of ideas into mature solutions.

The CAPSELLA Accelerator Programme is a complete innovation journey that will excite and reward those who will participate in it.

The Acceleration Phases

Phase 1 – Preparation

Call For Participants:Responding to an open call participants were granted a ticket to the CAPSELLA Acceleration journey based on their talent and obsession to build a startup.Warm Up Event:A warm-up event was organised to facilitate participants’ networking, team creation and information provision, to initiate the preparation for the Innovation Contest.

Phase 2 – The Innovation Contest (Capacity and Execution Contest):

Participants compete in teams, having complementary skills and backgrounds, to provide the most innovative solutions to the challenges of a CAPSELLA innovation contest.

Phase 3 – The Contest Follow-Up

Bootcamp:A three month period of unconditional free training on a) how to foster entrepreneurship (idea generation, management, marketing, etc), b) agriculture and related sustainability threats and c) how to use the CAPSELLA platform will be offered to the winners of the innovation contest.Phase 4 – Business Plan Competition:Business Plan Competition among the graduates of the CAPSELLA Training Bootcamp will decide which of them will proceed to the next phase, incubation.Phase 5 – Incubation:The Winner of the BP Competition will receive a 3 months incubation and housing, cash prize and further business training, industry mentoring, services, and fundraising aid in the most prominent incubator in sunny Athens, Greece.

The CAPSELLA Accelerator Programme is a complete innovation journey that will excite and reward those who will participate in it.

More info on the phases available at the Acceleration Phases tab.

Organisers and Supporters

The CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme is coordinated by Corallia, a Unit of the Research Center Athena with the support of We Deliver Taste, Agroknow, Zephyr, Aston University, Rete Semi Rurali, Zuidelijke Land-en Tuinbouworganisatie Vereniging and Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna.

The Programme is supported by TP Organics, the Copernicus Academy (GR-CAN) and Copernicus Relay Network in Greece (GR-CRN) and the Agricultural University of Athens.

CAPSELLA (the Collective Awareness PlatformS for Environmentally-sound Land management based on data technoLogies and Agrobiodiversity) is a project co-funded by the European Union (Project No. 688813. ICT-10-2015 Collective Awareness Platforms for Sustainability and Social Innovation) with the aim to address and provide open data ICT solutions to sort out key societal hot issues such as the proper use and management of agricultural land and agro-biodiversity to ensure the understanding of the importance of good quality food as the last segment of the agro biodiversity process. CAPSELLA supports the current effort at European level for building innovative, diversity-based and quality and health-centered food systems with tailored-made IT solutions.

Under the auspices of the Ministry of Rural development and Food of the Hellenic Republic

The CAPSELLA Bootcamp, organized as a follow-up to the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest on October 2017, has been successfully completed. The three-month free training was developed to support the CAPSELLA Bootcamp participants turn their initial concept into a start-up.

The CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme has provided its participants with the key skills to innovate in the agri-food sector and succeed as entrepreneurs. Their ideas have been incubated thanks to a highly interactive programme, giving them the chance to experiment, create, learn, and mentor. This prepared them for the business plan competition, which was won by PROGRAGROS, a start up building a digital farmer-consumer marketplace.

Three types of training were provided during this phase: training on how to use the CAPSELLA platform, training on how to foster entrepreneurship and thematic training on agriculture and related sustainability threats.

In total, eight modules were delivered on agriculture and related sustainability threats: “Transition to Agroecology, Connecting the Urban with the Rural from Seed to Stomach, and back to the Land” and “Sustainable Urban Food Systems, Hacking the Metabolism of the City: how communities and technology can improve the local food system” offered by Pavlos Georgiadis, member of the We Deliver Taste CAPSELLA team, “Viticulture and Climate Change, Overview and Analysis of Viticultural Data”, offered by Dr. Maritina Stavrakaki, member of the Agroknow CAPSELLA team, “Waste management from a chain perspective”, offered by Peter Paree, member of the ZLTO CAPSELLA team, “Transition to Agroecology, The dynamic management of agrobiodiversity, how seed networks contribute to the maintenance and continued evolution of seed diversity”, offered by Livia Ortolani, member of the Rete Semi Rurali CAPSELLA team, “Transition to Agroecology, The dynamic management of agrobiodiversity, the seed legislation and the issue of privacy for agrobiodiversity data management” offered by Riccardo Bocci, member of the Rete Semi Rurali CAPSELLA team “Transition to Agroecology, The use of functional diversity for preserving soil health” offered by Dr. Mariateresa Lazzaro, member of the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna CAPSELLA team and Dr. Stefano Carlesi is a Research fellow at Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna,

One module was delivered dedicated to the use of the CAPSELLA Platform “Developing infrastructures for supporting Agriculture Communities, The CAPSELLA Platform” offered by Panagiota Koltsida, member of the Athena RC CAPSELLA team

Seven modules were delivered on how to foster entrepreneurship, “Bootcamp Kick-off”, “Project Management” offered by Yiannis Vithynos from Critical Path, “Business Plan Development”, offered by Dr. Nikolaos Petridis, member of the Aston CAPSELLA team, “Entrepreneurial Marketing” and“Communications for Start-Ups” offered by Stephen Benians, member of the Zephyr CAPSELLA team, “IP Management” offered by Vaggelis Papakonstantinou from MP Legal and “Financial Management and Investment Readiness” offered by Andreas Acavalos from KEMEL.

CAPSELLA Innovation Contest Awards

Phase 2, the warm-up event was held online and the innovation contest itself was located in The American College of Greece 6 Gravias Street GR-153 42, Aghia Paraskevi, Greece.

Phase 3, the bootcamp will be offered online through the CAPSELLA training platform, available here.

Phase 4 will be held in the a2-innohub, Kifissias Ave. 44, Monumental Plaza-Building C, GR-15125 Maroussi and online.

The incubation of phase 5 will be offered in the most suitable incubator in Athens.

Challenges

The CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme is dedicated to Ecological, Biodiversity based and Organic agriculture. For the innovation contest participants are free to choose from the CAPSELLA cutting edge challenges to compete.

Challenge Code

Challenge Title

CAP01

“Half the methane emissions from bio-waste in landfills”
to contribute to climate protection and resource conservation

CAP02

“Build an easy to use service for farmers to safeguard soil health”
and integrate farmers’ observations with data from remote sensing

CAP03

“Design a tool to predict climate change impact on grapevine growth stages”
to ensure a sustainable and resilient viticulture and wine sector in Europe

CAP04

“Connecting local Organic Producers with Consumers & Food Businesses”
and help Localise the Food System

CAP05

“Design an App for handling data on locally adapted plant varieties”
to make the right choice about what varieties to grow and local needs

CAP06

“Extending the CAPSELLA platform services”
and make it valuable to the broader agriculture community

CAP07

“Build a tool to spread knowledge about the importance of agrobiodiversity and its benefits for the planet and our health”

Prize Title

Prize Description

3.000 €

The winning team of the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest will win 3.000 €.

2.000 €

The second winning team of the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest will win 2.000 €

1.000 € Gift Voucher

The third winning team of the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest will win 1.000€

Bootcamp

The 10 best teams of the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest will win a place in the CAPSELLA Bootcamp, a three month unconditional free training, covering business and agro-related topics, to support them to turn their initial concept into a start-up.

Incubation

3-months a fully-fledged incubation will be offered to the winning team of the business plan competition, including also further mentoring, support in the submission in proposals submission and training customized to match with the background, strategy, implementation plan and the real needs of the team.

Innovation Tour

The winning team of the business plan competition will win an innovation tour offered by Corallia including meetings with key stakeholders related to its business and the identification of prospective customers, business providers, partners and staff that the team would be interested in.

Registration

CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme is open to all people older than 18 years, with any level of education and from any scientific/professional field without any restrictions. It is addressed to students, PhDs. young scientists, agriculturists, developers, programmers, designers, engineers, finance experts, communication experts, marketeers, business women/men, farmers, entrepreneurs, entrepreurs-to-be etc. as well as new technology enthusiasts, those excited by the development of innovative tools, solutions, applications, processes and new business models and those willing to participate in the sustainable development of primary production. The CAPSELLA co-creation process is also open to all related European Innovation partnerships, NGOs, other CAPS projects and maker projects that are invited to become [part of the CAPSELLA community.

Participation in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme is free of charge.

Participation requests could be submitted until the 29th of September only through the following link. Only participation requests submitted within the given submission period were considered valid. No participation request was accepted after the submission deadline. After the successful submission of a valid participation request you received a confirmation of receipt via email.

Applications to participate in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme are open to individuals. The selected individuals from phase one has then formed teams from 2 to 5 people to participate in the innovation contest (phase 2), thus achieving complementarity, balance and the availability of all needed skills in each team in order to respond to the the contest challenges more efficiently.

Why should I participate?

To make this world a better place offering new solutions to agriculture related challenges and sustainability threads.

To put your exceptional technical talent, strong scientific or business background to use.

To meet people active in the agri-food sector.

To create new products and solutions for the agri-food sector.

To materialize your desire launch and build your Start-Up in the agri-food sector.

To get guidance and support on the development of your proposed solution.

To take advantage of the unique prizes offered during the phases of the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme.

To have fun and meet new people that share the same interests with you.

Do you want to take part in the CAPSELLA journey? – Register here – CLOSED

Do you want to become part of the CAPSELLA community and become a supporter/sponsor/volunteer of the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme? – Contact us and we will get in touch with you shortly!

FAQs

Is the participation to CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme free of charge?Yes it is free.

Where and until when should I apply to participate in CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme?You can apply only online via the webpage. Deadline for applications is on the 29th of September at 23:59.

Will I have to be part of a team or can I compete individually?Applications for participation in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme are only available for individual applicants. For the participation in the innovation contest being part of a 2-5 persons team is obligatory. Only team participations are eligible to participate in the innovation contests. Finally, once the participants have made it to phase 3, during the bootcamp, and in order to prepare themselves for the business plan presentation

Which is the deadline to form a team?After successfully being selected as a participant in phase 2 you can start building your team. You can complete your team formation until one hour before the start of the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest. To meet your potential team members you can participate in the informative event for participants, the WarmUp Event.

Of how many team members can each team participating in the Innovation Contest consist?Each participating team can consist of 2 to 5 members.

Do I have to bring with me technological equipment during my participation in the Innovation Contest?Participants should bring all the needed technical equipment for their participation computers/ laptops, chargers and power strips. No technological equipment is provided from the organisers during the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest. During the contest high speed connection will be provided in the contest venue for the participants.

What will the organizers offer during the innovation contest (and what they will not offer)?The organizers will offer:

During the innovation contest, when I will not be in the room will my equipment be safe?The place will be guarded by a professional secuity service throughout the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest.

During the innovation contest can I stay at the event throughout its whole duration?Yes you may stay overnight in the venue of the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest. Don’t forget to bring your sleeping bags!

Will food be provided during the innovation contest?Yes, food will be offered for free to all participants throughout the duration of the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest in the contest venue.

Who will own the Intellectual Property I will develop during the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme?The intellectual property created from the individuals and teams during and as a result of their participation in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme belongs solely to its creators according to the current legislative framework. Participants also fully maintain any pre-existing copyright of their work and of the results of a this work, which were produced before their participation in the programme. With their participation in the programme, participants explicitly agree to provide the right to the organizers to use and display the results exclusively for implementation and promotion purposes, or in order to highlight the results of the programme. Any public reference to the participants’ outcomes/ creations (name, key features etc.) made by the Organisers, shall include a reference to the creators of the corresponding business idea/ application.

Can I participate in the Innovation Contest remotely?
Yes as long as you join a team with 2 members that are physically attending

1. Content – Scope

1.1 The «CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme> » (hereafter «the Programme» or «CAP»), is coordinated by Corallia Unit of the Athena Research Center, with the support of We Deliver Taste, Agroknow, Zephyr, Aston University, Rete Semi Rurali, Zuidelijke Land- en Tuinbouworganisatie Vereniging and Scuola Superiore Di Study Universitari e di Perfezionamento Santanna (hereafter «the Organisers»). The Programme will span from July 2017 to June 2018 is governed by the current term and conditions of Participation in the CAPSELLA Acecleration programme (hereafter «Terms and Conditions»).

1.2 Participation in the Programme is governed by the provisions that are included in the terms of the present notice, as well as by the additional terms of the participation covenant to the Programme (hereinafter, “ Participation Covenant”), which must be signed by the participants who will proceed to the Bootcamp phase and participants whose business plans will get through, by means of the evaluation procedure, to the Incubation stage of the Programme. The Participation Covenant will include reasonable terms, in accordance with the principle of good faith, with regards to the expected behavior of the participants in relation to the Building Infrastructure and the other participants, as well as in relation to the individual provision of other benefits of the Programme, as set out in the present document, specifying the same and the precise way they are provided (indicatively, minimum requirements as regards physical presence at the Building Infrastructure, exploitation of the Supporting Services, participation in Mentoring, monitoring of the Business Training and, in general, a wide exploitation of the infrastructures and benefits of the Programme, progress of the submitted business plan on the basis of specific indexes (KPIs) etc).

1.3 The CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme aims to promote innovation for diversity-based food systems in European agriculture, supporting the development of innovative solutions and applications that utilize agriculture-related big data, solutions that create new tools for farmers and propose new business models for land data governance. It is a programme designed to facilitate Open Innovation in the agrifood sector, to create new technologies, applications, platforms, and processes that will allow the upgrade of tools and methods that are implemented nowadays in the ecological, biodiversity based, organic agriculture sector. This actively contributes to the provision of improved services and experiences to the CAPSELLA stakeholders and communities, and to all Europeancitizens interested in sustainably produced, tasty and nutritious food (#AgriTech #Agri-food Technology).

2. Conditions of Participation

2.1 The CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme is open to natural persons, irrespective of their nationality or place of residence: (i) who are at least eighteen years old (on the start day of the Programme) (ii) with full legal capacity (iii) whose participation does not violate any regulations of any kind.

2.2 Employees of the organisers and their respective parent companies, affiliates, subsidiaries, advertising, promotion, fulfillment or other coordinating agencies, individuals providing services to the organisers through an outsourcer or temporary employment agency during the Innovation Contest period, and their respective immediate family members are not eligible to participate in the Innovation Contest.

2.3 Information on the CAPSELLA Acceleration programme for everyone interested in it will only be provided through its website, platform, as well as CAPSELLA Twitter account and Facebook.

2.4 The application to participate in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme is done by completing and submitting the entry form accessible from the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme platform. The deadline for submitting applications is on the 29th of September 2017.

2.5 Only individuals can apply to participate in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme. Those who will compete in Phase 2, the Innovation Contest, must obligatorily be organized into groups of two (2) to five (5) people, in order to have the required skills,complementarity and balance to develop and present a comprehensive idea within the Innovation Contest. This implies that all individual participants will have to join a group up to 1 hour before the beginning of the Innovation Contest and participation requests will not be finally accepted if the condition of team formation according to the aforementioned Terms and Condition has not been met until one hour previous to the starting time of the Innovation Contest. Switching teams is not allowed during the Innovation Contest. Organisers are not responsible for, and will not assist in resolving, any disputes between team members.

2.6 Participants, who are employees of a corporation, institution, government agency, or an academic institution, are responsible for ensuring that their participation complies with any policies their corporation, agency, or institution may have regarding participation in contests of this type. If the Organizer has reason to believe that a Participant violated any of those policies, the Organizer reserves the right to prohibit the Participant from participating in the Competition or receiving a prize at any time. The Organizer is not responsible for any disputes arising between a Participant and his/her employer.

2.7 Any disputes, claims and causes of action arising out of or connected with this Programme, or any Prizes awarded, other than those concerning the administration of the Programme or the determination of winners, shall be resolved individually, without resort to any form of class action.

2.8 Participants are required to provide accurate, current and complete information when participating in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme.

2.9 The organizers have the right to request a proof of identity from the Participants during the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme and disqualify at any phase of the Programme every participant that does not comply with the Terms and Conditions regarding the authenticity of his identity and his personal information. Organizers carry no responsibility in case of submission of false claims by the participants. In no event, in particular in case of disqualification, will the organizers reimburse any expenses made by the participants.

2.10 The organizers will present the challenges in detail to the participants that will be invited to compete in CAPSELLA Innovation Contest, at the Warm-Up event on the 25th of September online. Interested parties will be able to get informed on the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme website.

2.11 Participating in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme is free of charge for the Participants. However the participants must make their own travel and accommodation arrangements and cover all associated costs and expenses. Any possible cost of preparation for the participation in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme will be borne solely by the participants.

2.12 Participants must bring all the necessary equipment for their participation (his/her own laptops, chargers etc). The internet connection will be provided free of charge to the participants during the CAPSELLA Innovation contest.

2.13 Participants will be free to use APIs, applications, libraries and platforms. Furthermore, the organizers may provide participants during the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme with access to technology platforms or proprietary data or software that will be used to develop entrepreneurial ideas from contestants.

2.14 Participants in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme declare and assure that the business ideas / application they present at the Innovation Contest and the Business Plan Competition does not infringe on the intellectual property rights of any third party. The Work Results shall, in no event, infringe in any manner or induce infringement of any third party intellectual property rights. The responsibility for any infringement of intellectual property rights lies solely with the team of contestants and under no circumstances is the responsibility of the organizers. Should the right from identified third party right owner not be commercially available, the Work Result may not be qualified to win the prize. The Participant undertakes to indemnify the Organizers against all claims asserted by third-parties against the Organizer due to an actual or alleged infringement of rights resulting from the use of the Work Results, as well as against all litigation costs (including reasonable attorney fees) required to defend the Organizer against such claims, unless the Organizer itself is responsible for the infringement of rights by its gross negligence or willful misconduct.

2.15 Participation in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme implies unreserved acceptance of, in the sense of Greek Law 2472/1997, as currently in force, the storage and processing of participants’ data for organizational and publicity purposes of the Programme, as well as for communication purposes. Participants consent to the use of their name, photo, video and/or likeness, biographical information, entry and statements attributed to Participant (if true) for advertising and promotional purposes, including without limitation, inclusion in Organisers’ newsletters, website and any of the Organisers’ Social media accounts or outlets without additional compensation. Contestants declare that they agree to be recorded and / or photographed and / or videotaped during the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme and give the Organisers the right to use, transmit and retransmit such data through the platform of the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme, the CAPSELLA website, Organizers’ websites or social media, by waiving any right to remuneration/ compensation.

2.16 Participants retain all intellectual property rights concerning their proposed idea / application or work results that was under their ownership prior to the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme or developed during the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme according to the current legislative regime (Greek Law 2121/1993, as amended by Greek Law 4212/2013). However the Participants expressly authorize the Organizers, to publish, to communicate, to expose and to disclose, divulgate and represent the submitted ideas and Work Results verbally, graphically or in writing, in any medium worldwide and without restrictions in time, and by any means, either in present or in the future, free of charge, for the purpose of implementing, promoting and highlighting the results of the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme.

2.17 Participants have full and exclusive responsibility to protect their works and the rights deriving from them. Participants expressly declare that they assume this responsibility, releasing the organizers of the Programme of any related liability.

2.18 Submission of a request to participate in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme implies the full and unconditional acceptance of these Terms of Participation, after any amendments thereto.

3. Working bodies of the Programme

3.1 The working bodies of the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme are the Steering Committee, the Organizing Team και the Evaluation Committees of the initial application, the Innovation Contest and the Business Plan Competition.

3.2 The Steering Committee consists of employees of the organisers and has overall oversight responsibility for monitoring and coordinating all issues relating to the planning, organization, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme. They are the top management and decision making body.

3.3 The Organizing Group consists of employees of the organisers and its mission is to organize CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme, supervise the smooth conduct of CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme and in any way facilitate compliance with the Terms of Participation.

3.4 The Evaluation Committee of the call for participants consists of employees of the organisers, that will be called to assess the different types of applications. The Evaluation Committee of the Innovation Contest consists of five (5) people, accredited professionals, academics and investors, with deep knowledge of the agro- biodiversity sector.

3.5 The evaluation committee of the Business Plan Competition consists of three (3) people, accredited professionals, academics and investors, with deep knowledge of the agro- biodiversity sector.

4. Conduct of the Programme

4.1 The ultimate goal of the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme – «Creating innovative solutions for boosting the transition to ecological, diversity based, organic agriculture», is not only realized through a competition which will culminate on Friday 06.10.2017 and Saturday 07.10.2017. It includes a warmup event on 23.09.2017 to contribute to building stronger teams and deep understanding of CAPSELLA Acceleration Challenges, and continues after the competition by supporting the selected winners with a targeted growth program that includes training, mentoring and incubation to achieve the transformation of ideas into mature solutions.

4.2 The Innovation Contest will start at 16:30 on Friday 06 October 2017 and will finish on Saturday night 07 October 2017. The announcement of the winners will take place on the same day that the Innovation Contest is completed and after the presentation of the business ideas / applications to the Evaluation Committee.

4.3 The ideas that contestants will develop need to comply with the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme Challenges, as listed on the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme website, and thoroughly presented during the Warmup Event on the 23rd of September 2017.

4.4 Upon arrival of contestants on the Innovation Contest day, at noon of 6 October 2017, the Organisers will deliver them their name tag and guide them to their designated place in the venue. Early arrival is strongly recommended.

4.5 For security reasons, 24-hour access will only be permitted to those who have the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest tag name. Access to o visitors will be permitted from 16:30 on Saturday 7 October 2017, after informing the Organizers, to watch the presentation and award ceremony.

4.6 During the Innovation Contest, Mentors / Coaches will be present, on different time slots, providing their consultancy services free of charge on issues related to business, intellectual property, public relations and communication, marketing, project management and IT , related to the entrepreneurial idea / application of each competitor, in order to achieve the best possible result from each participating team.

4.7 Participation in the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest requires contestants to travel to the city and the venue of the contest by their same means. The Organisers will offer contestants the possibility of a free overnight stay at the contest venue during the Innovation Contest. Free food will also be offered to contestants Participants during the Innovation Contest in the Innovation Contest venue. It should be noted that only the contestants are responsible for their own safety and security and for the safetyof their personal belongings (equipment, etc.) during their stay at the Innovation Contest venue, which, however, in any case, professional security services will be offered on a 24-hour basis throughout the Innovation Contest.

4.8 Organizers disclaim any liability for damages arising from loss of profits and / or the certainty or expectation of contestants/participants to obtain direct or indirect profit from participating in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme.

4.9 The CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme will be conducted in English and Greek. Especially during the Final Presentation from the participating teams at the last phase of the Innovation Contest the English language must be used. In any case whenever the use of terminology or technical data is required, international terminology will be used.

4.10 Participants are allowed to participate remotely to the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest on the 6th and 7th of October 2017. A minimum of two team members shall be physically attending the event. The maximum team size of five members also includes remote participants. Remote participants are also obliged to follow the Programme’s application process. The sole responsibility to ensure the availability of means for the communication with remote team members rests within the team and in no case can the organisers be held liable in case of miscommunication or unavailability of communication means.

5. Evaluation process and criteria

5.1 The call for participants will be open until 29 September 2017. The evaluation criteria for the assessment of the applications will be: The existence of a strong technological, scientific or business background (based on application type), innovation spirit, motivation of the applicant to engage into the CAPSELLA Innovation Process and desire to build a Start-Up.

5.2 For the Innovation Contest the evaluation process will start on Saturday afternoon 7 October 2017. The contestants will present their ideas to the Evaluation Committee and the Evaluation Committee members will score them. Each contest team will have 5 minutes to present its idea. The evaluation process is based only on the Evaluation Criteria, the Final Presentations of the Teams and their answers to the Evaluation Committee’s members Questions. The Evaluation Committee evaluates and ranks the business ideas / applications based on the following evaluation criteria:
– Relevance of the idea with the agri-food sector,
– Innovativeness of the idea, Aptitude for commercial exploitation,
– Team completeness and complementarity,
– Maturity level of the idea to be converted into an application, product service, platform, method or process.

5.3 For the Business Plan Competition Evaluation on March 2018the evaluation process is based only on the Evaluation Criteria, the Business Plans that the Teams will have submitted, the Final Presentations of the Teams and their answers to the Evaluation Committee’s Questions. The Evaluation Criteria are only the following:
– Relevance of the plan with the agro- biodiversity sector.
– Does the plan tackle major problems of the CAPSELLA communities and/or major agro-food and sustainability related challenges?
– Innovativeness of the plan.
– Aptitude for commercial exploitation,giving the opportunity to enter a local or international market of a sufficient size.
– Team members have complementarity and the necessary skills, knowledge and abilities, as well as the required profile for the successful materialization of the plan.
– A reasonable and realistic preliminary action plan is in place, which must be materialized within nine and up to eighteen (9-18) months, in order to establish the feasibility and/or the value of the business plan (proof of concept/proof of value) and convert the idea into an application, product service, platform, method or process.

5.4 The rating given by each Evaluation Committee member ranks from 1 (lower grade) to 10 (highest grade).

5.5 Participants no right to raise any objections on the selection of the Evaluation Committee, as well as the final specification of the above evaluation criteria by the Evaluation Committee at any time.

5.6 The members of the Evaluation Committee might change at the Organisers’ sole discretion and upon availability.

5.7 In the event of a conflict of interest, a member of the Evaluation Committee may disqualify him/herself or be disqualified by the Organisers from passing judgment on a particular team or participant. Such disqualification shall not affect the judging or review of the team or Participants submission by other members of the Evaluation Committee.

6. Winners and awards

6.1 For the Innovation Contest, after the completion of the evaluation process, participations will be ranked and the highest ranked entries on the score board will be awarded with the CAPSELLA prizes.

6.2 The ten (10) best teams of the CAPSELLA Innovation Contest will qualify to proceed to the CAPSELLA Bootcamp, being offered a three (3) month period of training and mentoring designed to support them to turn their initial concept into a start-up.

6.3 Finally a prize of three (3) months of fully fledged incubation and mentoring will be offered to the winning team of the Business Plan Competition.

6.4 The Organisers will not be involved nor shall it be held liable in case of litigation with companies who have developed the offered prizes.

7. Other Terms

7.1 Participation in the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme constitutes Participant’s full and unconditional agreement to and acceptance of and continued compliance with all the Terms. Determination of eligibility and compliance is at the sole discretion of Organisers. Organisers reserve the right to disqualify any Entry if the Entry or a Participant or a Participant’s team does not comply with these Terms.

7.2 The Organisers retain the right to unilaterally and without any liability revoke / modify change, supplement, add provisions or remove provisions from these Terms and Conditions (including the conditions on the commencement, duration and Closure of the Acceleration Programme and its’ different phases) and / or terminate the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme, informing participants accordingly through the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme website. The date that these revocations / modifications will be the date of such notification.

7.3 The Organisers are fully entitled to disqualify a Participant or a team which does not abide by the Terms and Conditions or acts in any other way deemed inappropriate by the Organisers; such inappropriate behavior could for example be the taking of drugs or other illegal substances during the Innovation Contest, harmful and discriminating statements, hacking or manipulating or attempt to hack or manipulate the IT system or the data of the Organisers or other teams.

7.4 In the event of any breach of any of the Terms and Conditions, or of the applicable law, and/or any violation of a third party’s right, whenever this becomes known, the Organisers may exclude the participating team from the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme or revoke the decision to be awarded as a winner, to claim the refund of the prize, as well as to restore any damage caused by the violation of the present terms to a third person or to the Organisers themselves.

7.5 The Organisers are not responsible and assume no liability for lost, misdirected or late submissions or for (i) electronic transmission errors, (ii) theft, destruction, change of or unauthorized access to submissions, (iii) technical problems, malfunctions or errors in the operation of any hardware or software which are necessary for the transmission of submissions or the planned CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme procedure, including computer viruses and bugs, or for manipulations, unauthorized access, scams, overload of the Internet or a website or any combinations of these, nor for other causes not subject to the inspection by the Organisers. In case any of the above events occurs, the Organisers retain the right to take one or several of the following measures according to its sole discretion: to disqualify each person who manipulates the submission or voting procedure as well as to adjust, change, postpone or cancel the submission.

7.6 Each attempt to intentionally damage a website or to undermine the legal procedure of the CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme is a breach of provisions under criminal and civil law; in such a case the Organisers retain the right to demand compensation from the concerned persons using all legal possibilities.

7.7 The whole terms and conditions text is drawn up in English. Participants hereby acknowledge that they fully comprehend their rights and obligations derived from the present text. Any documents, notices, meetings or other processes relative thereto may also be written or conducted in Greek.

7.8 The CAPSELLA Acceleration Programme is governed and construed in accordance to the Greek law and any dispute that may arise under this or in connection with this subject shall be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Courts of Athens – Greece.

Capsella has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 688813

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